The University of Hawaii's
new Outreach College is reaching
more students via interactive
TV and Internet classes

By Debra Barayuga
Star-Bulletin

Technology is changing the face of higher education.

Years ago, the only way to take a University of Hawaii course was to register in person and show up for classes. Today, people can register via the World Wide Web as well as take courses electronically without having to commute or step foot on campus.

The focus of the University of Hawaii's Outreach College -- formed last month by merging the Summer Session and the College of Continuing Education and Community Service -- was to expand its outreach to the neighbor islands and remote communities on Oahu and provide more distance-learning opportunities.

Officials hope the merger will open opportunities for disabled students and students who work, have families or live on the neighbor islands and can't come to the UH-Manoa campus to take courses.

"It's really important for Manoa to serve distance sites in our island state," said Victor Kobayashi, interim dean of the Outreach College. "Increasingly, students feel the university should send the classes to them rather than coming to campus to take classes."

Distance learning is not new. The university has offered correspondence courses for some time. For several years, courses have been available through the Hawaii Interactive Television System, which offers two-way video and audio. And with the Internet, it's possible for courses to be delivered more efficiently, Kobayashi said.

Barriers that deter people from enrolling can be eliminated by sending courses electronically to people's homes, offices or to centers where people have access to computers, he said. Instructors who are not so mobile also can work from their office or home.

The Outreach College hopes to move into combining electronic systems to send courses to the neighbor islands and the rest of the world and to receive courses from other universities, Kobayashi said. "It may change the whole character of higher education."

During the spring and fall semesters, UH Hawaiian language Professor Puakea Nogelmeier broadcasts live his third- and fourth-level Hawaiian classes to the neighbor islands via the Hawaii Interactive Television System. Students and Nogelmeier can hear and see each other on a TV screen. When Nogelmeier asks a question of the Kauai group, the screen immediately clicks to Kauai students so students tuned in across the state can see and hear them.

"It's a less than optimum educational environment because you miss the personal contact of the teacher with the student," he said. But he makes it a point to hold the class from sites on Maui, Kauai and Molokai at least once or twice a semester to make more personal contact with his neighbor-island students.

After taking 100- and 200-level Hawaiian language courses at Kauai Community College, Maka'ala Warriner faced having to commute to Honolulu or to UH-Hilo to complete the upper-level language courses.

As a small business owner, abandoning her business or island-hopping would have been impossible, she said. She wasn't the only student faced with the dilemma.

"If the upper-level Hawaiian language wasn't available through HITS, I would have been stuck," said Warriner who may repeat Hawaiian 401 if no other Hawaiian classes are made available via distance learning. "The more they can offer to the outer islands, the better off we'll be."

Depending on the students and the teacher, distance learning can be "really positive and productive," said Nogelmeier, who has taught distance learning classes for the past four years.

Some aspects can be less than perfect -- such as delays in moving papers back and forth and teaching a three-hour class only once a week for a semester rather than three one-hour sessions a week. With Internet courses, students can type in questions and interact with the instructor -- a boon for students who aren't comfortable about speaking up in class, Kobayashi said.

In the future, students will be able to see and hear each other and the instructor.

Technology can bring on its own set of problems. Guidelines on etiquette and behavior had to be drawn up because some people felt they were being sexually harassed on the Internet, Kobayashi said.